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Media Critiques
What the media doesn't usually say about the Assange fiasco
By Staff Writers, RT
RT.com
Sunday, Feb 7, 2016

© Andrew Winning / Reuters

Julian Assange is co-founder of whistleblower website WikiLeaks, who has been living in Ecuadoran embassy in London since 2012 because leaving it would likely result in his extradition to Sweden. In Sweden he was accused of sex crimes against two women. Assange says the case is part of US attempt to try him for espionage. Here are a few facts about the situation often omitted by the media.


There was no charge against Assange in Sweden. Swedish law enforcement wants to question him as part of a preliminary inquiry and insist on doing it on Swedish soil.



The US espionage case against Assange is not something he “believes” in - it is a fact. It exists as repeatedly confirmed by US Justice Department and the FBI.



The accusation of alleged rape by Assange has been disproven by the Swedish prosecutors in 2010. But the case was reopened on insistence of Claes Borgström, a Swedish politician and lawyer, who represented the two women.



After Assange left the country, Swedish investigators questioned 44 people in connection with the case in UK. Assange is not among them. The Swedish Court of Appeal (confirmed by Sweden’s Supreme Court) found in 2014 that the prosecutor had breached her duty in the Assange case by refusing to accept Assange’s statement in the UK for 5 years.



Assange left Sweden after being denied a residence and work permit, not fleeing an imminent arrest. He departed five weeks after the initial accusations were brought before the Swedish police, during which time the prosecutor declined to question him on a number of occasions.

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